AN ESSAY. 4S1 reasoning, laying aside every prejudice of flesh and mind, of appetite and passion, of pride and self-sufficiency, of antiquity and novelty, of education and company, &c. and not topass a judgment without such evidence as appears to be just and suffi- cient. This is a work of self-denial and sincerity, diligence and labour, to keep themind in a wise'suspense till arguments appear convincing, and then to yield up all its former mistakes and pre- judices to this conviction. This is truly rewardable in the sight of God. Blessed are they that have not seen, andyet have believed; John xx. 29. On the other hand, it is the will of man that hath the chief hand in infidelity : It is thewill that indulges prejudices against the gospel, it refuses to apply and hold the mind close to a dili- gent and faithful survey of it with all its evidences ; or it wisheth the gospel maynot be true, because it restrains its appetites or evil inclinations ; or it determines against it rashly upon slight and insufficient grounds ; it indulges an aversion to it without reason, and thereby becomes culpable, and is justly punishable. He that believeth not shall be damned ; Mark xvi. 18. Whereas the contrary opinion, which makes faith or unbelief, assent or dissent to the gospel, and acceptance or rejection of it, to be the necessary effect of present appearances of things to the under- standing, and supposes.things necessarily to appear according to the circumstances and situation in which they are placed, without interesting the free will and choice of man at all in the matter of faith or unbelief ; this opinion, I say, goes a great way toward the excusing of infidelity as innocent, and taking away the vir- tuous character and rewardableness of faith in the gospel. VIII. This doctrine of the self-determining powerof the will allows the blessed God a full freedom of choice iu distribut- ing his favours to which of his creatures he pleases, and in what degrees. It lays a just foundation of praise and thankfulness for all the free actions of his goodness and kindness to his creatures, according to those degrees of mercy and bounty which he distri- butes among them ; because he is not obliged to all those particu- lar actions or objects by a necessary and superior fitness; since he might have chosen to neglect those objects, or to manifest squalor superior goodness to other creatures, or to do it in much less degrees, or in other ways andmanners, any of which might have been equally fit and proper : as for instance, God Might have brought forth the soul of an American savage in the British islands, surrounded With light and knowledge ; or have produc- ed me among the savages in America in gross darkness, as well as in Great Britain, a land of light. My soul might have been united to a body born of African idolaters : he might halemade me blind and a cripple, as well as given me health and eye-sight; 1 might have had the brain of an idiot, and been bred up with- VoL. iv. li n
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